


A Romance in Seven Acts

by MerryArwen (lalaietha)



Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-05-24
Updated: 2010-05-24
Packaged: 2017-10-09 17:08:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,394
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/89711
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lalaietha/pseuds/MerryArwen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>But then there's Jordan Todd.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Romance in Seven Acts

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [LGBTFest 2010](http://community.livejournal.com/lgbtfest), on the prompt - _770\. Criminal Minds, Emily/Jordan, they're both kind of happy when Jordan leaves the team – without having to worry about the rules about inter-team relationships, being together is so much easier _; shares universe space with [Is This Your Card?](http://archiveofourown.org/series/2927)

1\. It isn't _all_ beautiful women. There's a type. Emily just couldn't tell you what it is. JJ, for instance - nobody could ever say Jaje isn't gorgeous. But nothing went off in Emily's head, meeting her. Penelope Garcia, also incredible, but of the kind that grew on Emily instead of shutting her brain off on walking into the room, and besides, everything that was patently obvious under the play flirting between her and Morgan gave Emily all she needed from the get-go to keep cool, to make sure everything just stays comfortable and friendly and the flirtation is a joke.

But then there's Jordan Todd.

Emily tries to tell herself how bad an idea it is to even think about dating a team-member (or anything else, thank you to her libido, shut up in the back), but it's hard to make herself listen. That's why she's here, leaning in the door to ask her how it's going, having seen her stalk out of Hotch's office earlier, and with Hotch's question (and nonplussed expression) fresh in her head.

And why her heart goes mildly stuttery when what she gets is a semi-hostile, semi-frustrated, "Why?"

". . . um," she says. She finds herself nervously brushing at her hair with one hand. "It's just a question - "

Jordan pauses and then turns around with the apologetic expression of the profoundly out-of-depth, and gestures helplessly at files with other files in the file-graveyard that was JJ's - no, the team liaison office. "I'm sorry," she tells Emily, "I just - "

She's standing in a room where the files of people asking for help are like an omnipresent force, and Emily has the sudden flash of intuition telling her that Morgan was here this morning, being Helpful. (Garcia would never set off this kind of frustration, Hotch has clearly not left his office in hours, possibly days, and Reid and Rossi are out of the office.) Emily steps the rest of the way in, and closes the door.

"Jordan," she says, and points at the closed door, letting it stand in synecdoche for the whole place, "as the last person to join this team, I . . . know how overwhelming all of this can be. It really does get easier."

Jordan closes her eyes, with the kind of deep breath you take when you don't want people to notice you're taking a deep breath. Emily adds, with the sting of conscience, "I'm not exactly sure that that's a good thing, though - "

Jordan's smiling now, at least a little bit, which also makes Emily's heart go mildly stuttery for a completely different reason and oh, shit, Prentiss, you are in so much trouble. "I?" Jordan says, sitting back down at her desk, "am going to manifest happiness and calm for the rest of the day."

She's gorgeous when she looks tiredly determined.

Oh yes, Prentiss, you are in _trouble._

She finds herself laughing kind of helplessly; Jordan looks calmer, and she should probably leave this office now, before her mouth comes out with something like _your necklace is really pretty, _or worse, _your throat is really elegant_ because that is both a bad idea and makes her sound like a vampire wannabe. "Happiness and calm," she says, "at the BAU, that's - " Emily pulls the door open. "Good luck with that."

Jordan's smiling, sharing the joke, but then says, "Oh - did you need something?"

Emily was kind of hoping she'd've got distracted away from that, but caught without a lie, she lights on, "Ah, yeah, I'm . . .waiting on a supplemental from the Houston field office so I can close out a report - if you can just let me know . . .when it gets here?"

_Very smooth, Emily_, she thinks, self-mocking. _Very smooth._ Jordan's eyebrows draw together. "An internal report report wouldn't come through me."

Emily suspects she has her deer-in-headlights expression. She opens her mouth to say something, and can't think of anything, and settles lamely on, "Really," as Jordan starts to smile one last time - a real smile. Well, at least she got a real smile. Emily could watch her smile all day.

It's not helping in the brain-cell department, but relief is good, too. Jordan says, "Thanks for checking up on me."

"Yeah," Emily says, "okay. Well, if you need anything, I'm around."

She steps out of the liaison office, closes the door, and is caught between turning around to beat her head against it, and grinning like an idiot.

Oh, this is going to be a long maternity leave. It's all she can do to keep from calling Jaje right now and begging her to come back, before Emily makes an idiot of herself.

****

2\. If there is a worse feeling than the one that lodged itself in the pit of Jordan's stomach when Morgan said, "On Hotch's scale? An eleven," Jordan does not want to know what it is. It's sticking with her, and it's halfway between nausea and pain, and she hasn't felt this bad about disappointing someone since she was twelve and her mom caught Jordan taking change out of her purse without asking.

Flashbacks to feeling like she's in middle-school were not among the things she expected to have to deal with at the BAU.

She is manifesting calm, though. Not happiness, no, not even she's good enough to do that right now, but she is absolutely manifesting calm, and working on tomorrow's press release so she can submit it in advance. So when Hotch calls her cell and tells her she's accompanying Emily tonight, find appropriate clothes, she winds up staring at the phone for a few seconds after he hangs up.

"Did you - " she starts, when (party-dressed and made up and everything) she meets up with Emily outside of their target's club, and Emily waves it away.

"There are no words to describe how much I don't want to deal with Viper alone," she says, making a joke out of it, which Jordan knows means that yes: Emily did stick her neck out with Hotch for Jordan over this.

It would be easier not to have a crush on the woman if she'd just stop being such a great person. Jordan tells her this in no uncertain terms - assuming Emily is a telepath, that is. Out loud, all she says is, "I'll protect you," and gets a thrill when Emily throws back her head and laughs.

(Later, she almost chokes when Viper sullenly announces that the only reason her pupils aren't showing the dilation of attraction is because she's stuck on someone else. _If only you knew, little man. If only you knew._)

****

3\. Emily's actually pretty good at hiding things from her team, although much like the BAU getting easier in general, she's not always sure that's a good thing. But she tells Spencer on purpose - well, semi-on-purpose - when he comes over for a movie. She knows when she does it that he's going to start gently teasing her about it, but she also does it because that way she's not being unfair when she teases him slightly less gently about his girlfriend, and how carefully he waited until the pickup-artist-serial-killer who tried to kill her pled guilty before he followed up on her sending him back his card with her lipstick imprint.

So a week later, when he's over to play chess, it doesn't surprise her at all when he says, "Jordan looked really pretty today," like he's just making a matter-of-fact observation.

Not surprised, but that doesn't mean she's happy. Emily gives him a dire look over the top of her scotch.

"I know where you live," she tells him.

"But not my building entrance code," he counters, and then, slightly more seriously, "You know it's really not a good -"

"_Yes_," Emily cuts him off, weary. "Yes I know that in-team relationships are absolutely verboten, yes I know that even in-Bureau fraternization is grounds to get me up to my neck in shit even though it's amazing how often that gets ignored as long as everyone's completely outside each other's chain of command, _yes_, I know that . . . issues of sexuality will make this all worse, yes, okay? Don't think I haven't been thinking this."

Reid holds up his palms in surrender, and Emily subsides, leaning her ice-filled glass against her forehead. "Besides," she adds, "I don't even know if she likes women. This is entirely the product of my . . . screwed up, fevered, completely unhelpful brain."

Spencer Reid frowns, slowly, and gives her a long look. Then he says, tentatively, "You mean you haven't noticed she's been wearing the earrings you complimented her on at least three times a week since you said they were a great frame for her face?"

Emily stares at him. Then she puts her glass down, leans forward, and puts her face in her hands. "You know that conversation we had about when you _don't_ tell people stuff you've noticed - " she starts.

Reid finishes, "That was an example?"

"Well, if you wanted to help me _not_ get fired," Emily sighs.

 

****  


  
4\. What Dave Rossi doesn't understand, what he can't understand because Jordan's not about to tell him, is that right there on the lawn in front of that house is the first time she ever said the words _I'm not sure I can do this._

Jordan Todd has always been able to do what she decided to do, and she'd decided to do this. She decided to do this, and now she's not sure she can - no, that's a lie. She's almost sure she can't, by now, and it's kind of a choking feeling.

Maybe it's better because what he said was, _That's okay, kiddo. There's nothing wrong with that._ She doesn't know, she can't tell if that made it better or not. If, given who and what he is, and who and what she is, that doesn't maybe make it worse, like he's giving her a pass he'd never give anyone else.

Jordan had known JJ would be coming in, with the baby; she even thinks she probably would have been welcome. She stays away anyway; she's not sure she can deal with someone's child on a day when she saw the rotting bodies of someone else's. She focuses on paperwork, instead, or tries to, while out of the corner of her eye she sees the shapes (through the window) of people leaving the bullpen.

Emily knocks at her office door - at the office door of the team liaison. Jordan starts, and looks up as Emily starts to say, "I was just checking to see if you needed a ri - " and she doesn't finish the word _ride_ because Jordan has to wipe her eyes when she looks up.

Sometimes Emily's face is an open book, and right now is one of them, but neither of them says anything for a minute, as Emily looks like she's caught between being embarrassed for intruding and wanting to find the perfect way to phrase the question, and Jordan decides today can't actually get much worse.

"If you don't mind, I'd love a ride home," she says, and gets her coat and her bag.

Jordan finds the radio the minute she gets in Emily's car, so they won't have to talk. Hotch gave everyone until noon tomorrow, without bothering to articulate why, because they all knew. She'll be able to get a ride back in to the BAU with someone.

The silence isn't comfortable, but it isn't bad, either. When it's over, Emily looks mildly embarrassed, and asks to use Jordan's bathroom. Jordan winds up offering her a drink, too, and then tries to tell herself that just because she's deciding to go back to Counterterrorism as fast as she can, that's no reason to court disciplinary action.

So it's only one drink. Then Emily smiles the way she does when she's not sure of herself, and pulls her coat back on.

Jordan almost doesn't believe she's spoken until the words, "Emily, how do you do this?" are out of her mouth. She puts her glass against her lips like she could take them back, but Emily's already looking wary.

"Do what?"

Jordan's not going to cry again. She's not. She refuses. "This job," she says. " All of it. You've been doing this for two years now and I know some of those cases were worse than today, and I don't know how you do it."

Emily looks torn, though between what and what, Jordan couldn't tell you. "I . . . compartmentalize well," she says, with the helplessness of someone who doesn't have a better answer. "Jordan - are you okay?"

Jordan glances at the picture on the wall behind Emily, and if it were anyone but Emily she might say_ yes, I'm fine, _but right here and right now she likes the truth better, so she says, "He used a shotgun on his daughters while they were sleeping. The flies were all over the room but what I can't get out of my head is the way the blood got all over her stuffed animals. I'm good at things, Emily," she says, and realizes her eyes are filling up again, blinks them fast to clear away the wet before it turns into actual tears. "I don't have many things I can't do, but I can't do this and I can't tell you," she finishes, taking a deep breath, "how much I wish Agent Jareau were coming back sooner."

And Emily says, "I'll be sad to see you go," and the words aren't much, but there's way more in that voice than Jordan expected, and everything refocuses and Jordan feels her eyes go wide while Emily freezes.

Then scrubs a hand over her face, in such a way as to not screw up her makeup. That has to be a talent. "I don't think it's a bad thing," Emily says, evenly, "to not be able to walk out of a house where a delusional unsub's murdered family's been for over a week, and want to go right out and do it again. At one point I thought I was going to leave the BAU and on my first half a day back, I got hit in the face with a four-by-four and got a concussion and while I was sitting in the back of the ambulance I realized I was happy to be back. I think it takes," she says, looking up like Someone needs to give her some words, "a particular - "

She stops, and then tries again, says, "Jordan, have you looked at us lately? My team is Hotch, who occasionally strangles his sense of humour and vestiges of happiness with his tie, Reid, Morgan," she says, as if these two stand for themselves, without comment needed, "Rossi, who's so ridiculously addicted to this job that he _came back out of retirement to do it again, _Garcia, who has to be the sanest person on our team and who . . . barricades her room with stuffed animals and brightly coloured everything and is also, I might add, the one who still does get seriously disturbed by our cases and half the time I think she's only still here because she's convinced the rest of us would get ourselves killed by the end of a day without her, JJ, who tried to pretend she _wasn't going into labour_ because she thought Reid needed us, and me. Trust me," she finishes, "thinking you'd be better off in a different line of work is a sign of good mental health."

"There's nothing wrong with you," Jordan replies, caught by how, if Emily seems to think Reid and Morgan's quirks need no explanation, her voice says that _she's_ just completely hopeless, and they wind up looking at each other, wordless, again.

Emily breaks it with a really soft, "My team is always . . . running the edge, Jordan. We've almost fallen apart before. I can't . . .jeopardize - "

"I understand," Jordan says, quickly, and tries to pretend it doesn't sting. "I wouldn't want - "

"JJ's back on the twelfth," Emily's voice runs over hers, and Jordan stops. "That's a Monday I - would you like to go for coffee, no, for dinner, or maybe coffee - whatever, on the sixteenth? And a ride back in to work and your car tomorrow morning?"

There's only one answer, and it's for both.

****

5\. Like always, Emily winds up buying three new outfits in the time between the asking and the date, and wears none of them, discovering something in her closet that works better at the last minute. She tries to remind herself that she's no longer nineteen, that she and Jordan have known each other for months now, that they already know they like each other, and it does nothing for the butterflies.

Emily wears red over black, a shirt with a complicated wrap over black silk pants; Jordan's dress is black and jewel-tone blue and they wind up laughing at the accidental half-match.

Later, they laugh more at how hard getting Emily out of that shirt turns out to be. And as if Emily's brain has to prove to her that she's still herself, and still as inept at this stuff as ever, she winds up asking, "How's Counterterrorism?"

But Jordan grins like it's a first-rate joke, leaning over Emily on Emily's bed (it being closer to the restaurant), her hair falling over her shoulder and her leg between Emily's, and says, "Exactly what I wanted."

****

6\. Jordan told her mom she had a date, of course: Jordan tells her mom very nearly everything. She even endured the third degree that came afterwards -_ is she nice, how did you meet her, what does her family do, does she go to church _("Mama, why do you always ask me that?" "Because someday I hope the answer'll be yes!"), and promised to let her mother know how it went.

When she wakes up on the morning of Saturday the 17th, Emily's still in bed beside her, dead to the world, smudged makeup and morning-after hair and everything, and apparently a deep sleeper. Jordan slides out of bed to go figure out the coffee-maker, and on the way she catches her personal phone and sends a text: _Fantastic._

****

7\. Today it's Nevada, something that looks straightforward, by BAU standards of straightforward. After the briefing there's the usual silence as everyone lets the thoughts steep. It's comforting. It's a pattern. It's home. Emily's still not sure that's a good thing, but it's better than the alternative.

Then comes the noise of movement, as everyone starts to move towards their favourite place to sit, to dig out iPods or knitting bags (Garcia always providing a fantastic extra distraction whenever she graced the jet with her presence), the deck of cards for Reid and JJ or whatever else passed the time - in Hotch's case, more work, in Rossi's, keeping an eye on his stocks.

Just before she settles in with her book, Emily looks up, glances around and says, "I realize this is graceless, but did I actually _need _to tell anyone about Jordan and I?"

Morgan snorts, looking amused and putting the earphone he'd lifted up back over his ear; JJ glances upwards for patience, sorting her cards; Rossi's ignoring her in favour of his phone; Reid says, looking at his hand of cards, "You should probably tell your mother," and she kicks him under the table because he deserves it.

Garcia raises a hand. "I feel I should be excused from the implications of that question because I'm not a profiler." Everyone laughs a bit.

When she gets up for coffee, Hotch is already there, and says, as if in passing, "Thank you, by the way, for your discretion." Which means apparently she wasn't quite as good at acting cool as she'd thought, or that Hotch has figured out almost all of her tells, and she's not sure which one of these two options she likes least.

"Strauss needs more reasons to go after me like she needs shoes with louder heels," Emily replies. She pauses, and adds, "But that was - "

"A long wait?" Hotch offers.

"Incredibly." She grins sheepishly, and then goes back to her seat. JJ's dealing again, and Emily kicks Reid's shin one more time for good measure. "Tell my mother," she mutters. "Have you told _your _mother about Austin yet?"

"I'm waiting for the appropriate opportunity," Reid says, and Emily laughs.


End file.
